Apple co-founder and Chairman Steve Jobs died today. He was
56.

Jobs had been suffering from various health issues following the
seven-year anniversary of his surgery for a rare form of pancreatic
cancer in August 2004. Apple announced in January that he would be
taking an indeterminate medical leave of absence, with Jobs then
stepping down from his role as CEO in late August.

Jobs had undergone a liver transplant in April 2009 during an earlier
planned six-month leave of absence. He returned to work for a year and
a half before his health forced him to take more time off. He told his
employees in August, “I have always said if there ever came a day when
I could no longer meet my duties and expectations as Apple’s CEO, I
would be the first to let you know. Unfortunately, that day has come.”

One of the most legendary businessmen in American history, Jobs turned
three separate industries on their head in the 35 (April 1, 1976)
years he was involved in the technology industry.

Personal computing was invented with the launch of the Apple II in
1977. Legal digital music recordings were brought into the mainstream
with the iPod and iTunes in the early 2000s, and mobile phones were
never the same after the 2007 debut of the iPhone. Jobs played an
instrumental role in the development of all three, and managed to find
time to transform the art of computer-generated movie-making on the
side.

The invention of the iPad in 2010, a touch-screen tablet computer his
competitors flocked to reproduce, was the capstone of his career as a
technologist. A conceptual hybrid of a touch-screen iPod and a slate
computer, the 10-inch mobile device was Jobs’ vision for a more
personal computing device.

Jobs was considered brilliant yet brash. He valued elegance in design
yet was almost never seen in public wearing anything but a black mock
turtleneck, blue jeans, and a few days worth of stubble. A master
salesman who considered himself an artist at heart, Jobs inspired both
reverence and fear in those who worked for him and against him, and
was adored by an army of loyal Apple customers who almost saw him as
superhuman.

Jobs was born in San Francisco in 1955 to young parents who gave him
up for adoption. Paul and Clara Jobs gave him his name, and moved out
of the city in 1960 to the Santa Clara Valley, later to be known as
Silicon Valley. Jobs grew up in Mountain View and Cupertino, where
Apple’s headquarters is located.

He attended Reed College in Oregon for a year but dropped out,
although he sat in on some classes that interested him, such as
calligraphy. After a brief stint at Atari working on video games, he
spent time backpacking around India, furthering teenage experiments
with psychedelic drugs and developing an interest in Buddhism, all of
which would shape his work at Apple.

Back in California, Jobs’ friend Steve Wozniak was learning the skills
that would change both their lives. When Jobs discovered that Wozniak
had been assembling relatively (for the time) small computers, he
struck a partnership, and Apple Computer was founded in 1976 in the
usual Silicon Valley fashion: setting up shop in the garage of one of
the founder’s parents.

Wozniak handled the technical end, creating the Apple I, while Jobs
ran sales and distribution. The company sold a few hundred Apple Is,
but found much greater success with the Apple II, which put the
company on the map and is largely credited as having proven that
regular people wanted computers.

It also made Jobs and Wozniak rich. Apple went public in 1980, and
Jobs was well on his way to becoming one of the first tech industry
celebrities, earning a reputation for brilliance, arrogance, and the
sheer force of his will and persuasion, often jokingly referred to as
his “reality-distortion field.”

The debut of the Macintosh in 1984 left no doubt that Apple was a
serious player in the computer industry, but Jobs only had a little
more than a year left at the company he founded when the Mac was
released in January 1984.

By 1985 Apple CEO John Sculley–who Jobs had convinced to leave Pepsi
in 1983 and run Apple with the legendary line, “Do you want to spend
the rest of your life selling sugared water or do you want a chance to
change the world?”–had developed his own ideas for the future of the
company, and they differed from Jobs’. He removed Jobs from his
position leading the Macintosh team, and Apple’s board backed Sculley.

Jobs resigned from the company, later telling an audience of Stanford
University graduates “what had been the focus of my entire adult life
was gone, and it was devastating.” He would get the last laugh.

He went on to found NeXT, which set about making the next computer in
Jobs’ eyes. NeXT was never the commercial success that Apple was, but
during those years, Jobs found three things that would help him
architect his return.

The first was Pixar. Jobs snapped up the graphic-arts division of
Lucasfilm in 1986, which would go on to produce “Toy Story” in 1995
and set the standard for computer-graphics films. After making a
fortune from Pixar’s IPO in 1995, Jobs eventually sold the company to
Disney in 2006.

The second was object-oriented software development. NeXT chose this
development model for its software operating systems, and it proved to
be more advanced and more nimble than the operating system
developments Apple was working on without Jobs.

The third was Laurene Powell, a Stanford MBA student who attended a
talk on entrepreneurialism given by Jobs in 1989 at the university.
The two wed in 1991 and eventually had three children; Reed, born in
1991, Erin, born in 1995, and Eve, born in 1998. Jobs has another
daughter, Lisa, who was born 1978, but Jobs refused to acknowledge he
was her father for the first few years of her life, eventually
reconciling with Lisa and her mother, his high-school girlfriend
Chris-Ann Brennan.

Jobs returned to Apple in 1996, having convinced then-CEO Gil Amelio
to adopt NeXTStep as the future of Apple’s operating system
development. Apple was in a shambles at the time, losing money, market
share, and key employees.

By 1997, Jobs was once again in charge of Apple. He immediately
brought buzz back to the company, which pared down and reacquired a
penchant for showstoppers, such as the 1998 introduction of the iMac;
perhaps the first “Stevenote.” His presentation skills at events such
as Macworld would become legendary examples of showmanship and star
power in the tech industry.

Jobs also set the company on the path to becoming a
consumer-electronics powerhouse, creating and improving products such
as the iPod, iTunes, and later, the iPhone and iPad. Apple is the most
valuable publicly-traded company in the world, surpassing
ExxonMobil?’s market capitalization in August.

He did so in his own fashion, imposing his ideas and beliefs on his
employees and their products in ways that left many a career in
tatters. Jobs enforced a culture of secrecy at Apple and was an
extremely demanding leader, terrorizing Apple employees when he
returned to the company in the late 1990s with summary firings if he
didn’t like the answers they gave when questioned.

Jobs was an intensely private person. That quality put him and Apple
at odds with government regulators and stockholders who demanded to
know details about his ongoing health problems and his prognosis as
the leader and alter ego of his company. It spurred a 2009 SEC probe
into whether Apple’s board had made misleading statements about his
health.

In the years before he fell ill in 2008, Jobs seemed to soften a bit,
perhaps due to his bout with a rare form of pancreatic cancer in 2004.

In 2005, his remarks to Stanford graduates included this line:
“Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve
ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because
almost everything–all external expectations, all pride, all fear of
embarrassment or failure–these things just fall away in the face of
death, leaving only what is truly important.”

Later, in 2007, he appeared onstage at the D: All Things Digital
conference for a lengthy interview with bitter rival Bill Gates,
exchanging mutual praise and prophetically quoting the Beatles: “You
and I have memories longer than the road that stretches out ahead.”

Jobs leaves behind his wife, four children, two sisters, and 49,000
Apple employees.

CNET’s Tom Krazit, Josh Lowensohn and Erica Ogg contributed to this
report.

Source : Yahoo! News

Apple has announced the latest version of its popular iPhone range at a special event at its Californian headquarters.

Rory Cellan-Jones looks at Apple's new iPhone 4S

The iPhone 4S, as the model will be known, boasts an improved camera and significantly extended battery life.

It will run the latest iOS5 operating system, which is set for release on 12 October.

The event was the first major announcement for new boss Tim Cook who took over from Steve Jobs in August.

The iPhone 4S, which will go on sale on 14 October, will be available in 16GB, 32GB and 64GB models – in both black and white.

It has the same look and feel as the existing iPhone 4 which was launched 15 months ago.

However, Apple said that updates to iOS meant the phone would boast some “200 new features”.
Voice control

Among the additions is an “intelligent assistant” that allows users to ask questions aloud and receive detailed answers back.

Siri, which began life as a third-party app, was purchased by Apple in 2010 but has yet to appear within its software.

Luke Peters, editor of gadget magazine T3, said that the software announcements would do just enough to keep Apple fans interested in the face of strong challenges from rival smartphone manufacturers.

“Some people were looking for a brand news phone and they haven’t got that today, so some will be disappointed,” he told BBC News.

“But with the update to iOS5 and Siri that could be enough to sway people to make the investment.”
Disappointment

Other industry watchers were less charitable about the iPhone refresh, and the non-appearance of the iPhone 5.

Gareth Beavis, phones editor at TechRadar said that the new hardware would leave many people underwhelmed.

“It was quite disappointing. I think there is going to be a lot of anger from users expecting something big bold and quite exciting after a long time of waiting from the iPhone 4.

“People will buy this in their droves, but Apple has missed a trick by just releasing the exact same phone again with marginally upgraded specs.”

For Apple’s new chief executive, the event was as much about making a statement about his leadership as it was new products.

Tim Cook had previously acted as interim boss, looking after the company while Steve Jobs was on sick leave.

Unlike his charismatic predecessor, Mr Cook left the biggest announcement of Tuesday’s event to a colleague – marketing boss Phil Schiller.

“Maybe he wants to bring other people to the forefront by letting others speak on his behalf,” said Gregory Roekens, chief technology officer at PR firm Wunderman.

“But in terms of style, it was underwhelming. People were expecting iPhone 5, but instead it’s almost fixing the weaknesses the previous phones had.

“It will be interesting to see how people react to that.”

Source : BBC News

Firefox 7 final version for Windows, Mac and Lunuz operating systems is now available for download. So those of you who want to download Firefox 7 final version can now do so from the Mozilla FTP servers.

The latest version of Firefox 7 includes the following change log:
Much improved memory use
Bookmark and password changes now sync almost instantly when using Firefox Sync
Added support for text-overflow: ellipsis
Added new rendering backend to speed up Canvas operations on Windows systems
Added support for the Web Timing specification
Added an opt-in system for users to send performance data back to Mozilla to improve future versions of Firefox.

Do note that Firefox 7 has not been officially released as of date, and if there are some of you (and I know there are many of you) who’d rather wait for its official release, its best you not download this version but wait for its official release, which should be around the corner.

But for those of you keen to install it, you can go ahead and download it.

The invitation that Amazon's PR firm sent to media, announcing a press conference that's likely about the Amazon tablet.

NEW YORK – The news that Amazon is building its own Android-based tablet has been an open secret for months. Next week, the mythical device is likely to be unleashed.

Amazon’s (AMZN, Fortune 500) PR firm sent an invitation to journalists midday Friday announcing a press conference in New York City on September 28. The e-mail did not include any details, but the the date matches up with the expected timeline for the Amazon tablet’s release.

For a device that hasn’t yet been released, the Amazon tablet has already received a lot of media play. Earlier this month, TechCrunch’s MG Siegler wrote that he had used the tablet.

The tablet runs on a tweaked version of Android, has a 7-inch tablet touch screen and is backlit, Siegler wrote, concluding that it’s “going to be a big deal. Huge, potentially.”

Analysts have even made sales forecasts about the yet-to-exist tablet, with Forrester analyst Sarah Rotman Epps writing way back in March that the market is ripe for disruption from Amazon.

Late last month, Rotman Epps released another report titled “Amazon Will Be Apple’s Top Competitor in Tablets.” Within a year, she predicts, “‘Amazon’ will be synonymous with ‘Android’ on tablets.”

The key is for Amazon to “compete on price, content, and commerce,” Rotman Epps says. If Amazon hits the right price point — one that significantly undercuts the iPad — and can keep up enough supply to meet demand, she expects Amazon’s tablet will “easily” sell 3 million to 5 million units in the fourth quarter.

By comparison, Apple (AAPL, Fortune 500) sold 3.27 million iPads in the tablet’s first quarter of existence. In its latest quarter, which ended June 30, Apple sold 9.3 million iPads.

If Amazon can unseat Apple as the tablet king — or even make a dent, really — it will have pulled off what several others have largely failed to do.

In the most extreme example, HP (HPQ, Fortune 500) killed off its TouchPad last month after just 49 days on the market. Other rivals are hanging on, but most of their devices have flopped critically and commercially.

BlackBerry maker Research in Motion (RIMM) released its PlayBook tablet in April to harsh reviews criticizing the device’s unfinished feel. Two Android-based tablets — Samsung’s Galaxy Tab and Motorola’s (MMI) Xoom — debuted at prices above the iPad’s $499 price point. Their sales have disappointed.

Source : CNN Money

Taiwanese chip designer Via is suing Apple claiming the US firm has infringed patents it owns.

Via claims Apple has "wilfully" infringed patents it owns in many of its products.

Via said the disputed ideas were used in Apple TV, the iPod, iPad and iPhone and the software they run on.

The patents involve the ways chips in these products use, transfer and manipulate data.

Via has filed a complaint with both an American district court and the US International Trade Commission.

The company’s boss Wen-Chi Chen said the firm was “determined to protect our interests and the interests of our stockholders” in a statement about the lawsuit.

The legal action is widely believed to be connected to an ongoing dispute between Apple and Taiwanese smartphone maker HTC. Mr Chen is married to HTC’s chairwoman Cher Wang, who co-founded both businesses.

Earlier rounds in the legal fight between the two saw Apple rack up a win as the HTC was found to have infringed two Apple patents. HTC has said it plans to appeal against that ruling.

HTC has filed three separate lawsuits against Apple over patents used in mobiles and tablets.

Apple has yet to issue a statement about the Via lawsuit.

The latest action is one of many patent spats in which Apple is involved. The company has taken action itself against Samsung in the US, Europe, Australia and South Korea. These have led to a ban on the sale of the Galaxy Tab 10.1 in Germany and bans on three smartphones in Holland.

In retaliation, Samsung has taken Apple to court in France and has counter-sued in the Netherlands.

Source : BBC

Battery-powered add-on arrives in December in Japan; Resident Evil Revelations, Metal Gear Solid Snake Eater 3D, Kingdom Hearts 3D among compatible titles. TOKYO–Earlier today Nintendo Japan held a press conference outlining a product roadmap of new Nintendo 3DS and Wii titles. Strangely, though, there was no mention of the widely rumoured (and practically confirmed) right analog stick attachment for the stereoscopic console.

Say hello to the Nintendo Expansion Slide Pad.
While the house of Mario is yet to officially confirm the existence of the add-on itself, a posting on the official Nintendo Japan website not only confirms it’s real but spills all of the details. According to the listing the peripheral will be called the Nintendo Expansion Slide Pad and will be available on December 10, 2011, for ¥1,500 ($19.46).

The Nintendo Japan website also lists six games that will support the Nintendo Expansion Slide Pad:
Metal Gear Solid Snake Eater 3D
Kingdom Hearts 3D
Resident Evil: Revelations
Ace Combat 3D: Cross Rumble
Dynasty Warriors VS
Monster Hunter Tri G

Exact specifics on how the Nintendo Expansion Slide Pad connects to the Nintendo 3DS are unknown at this stage. Interestingly, though, the Nintendo Japan website says that the peripheral will require one alkaline battery to operate, which suggests it will run off of its own power source.

The new lithium jelly battery is tougher than the rest

A new polymer jelly could be the next big step forward for lithium batteries.

The jelly replaces the volatile and hazardous liquid electrolyte currently used in most lithium batteries.

Researchers from the University of Leeds hope their development leads to smaller, cheaper and safer gadgets.

Once on the market, the lithium jelly batteries could allow lighter laptop computers, and more efficient electric cars.

In 2006, Dell recalled four million laptop batteries because of concerns that they might catch fire. Dell replaced them with batteries that used lower-performance electrodes, but these batteries were significantly larger.

Battery size still dictates the size and weight of most laptops, say the developers of the new battery.

Electronics manufacturer Apple got around the safety problem for their lightweight laptops with a solid polymer electrolyte, but in doing so, the power output of the computers suffered.

Overheating is also an issue for electric cars. Developers have had to use reinforced, steel-clad battery housings, multiple fuses and circuits to protect the battery during charging. All of these contribute to the cost and weight, and hence efficiency, of electric cars.
Thermal runaway

The newly developed jelly batteries should prevent “thermal runaway”, during which batteries can reach hundreds of degrees and catch fire.

The Leeds-based researchers are promising that their jelly batteries are as safe as polymer batteries, perform like liquid-filled batteries, but are 10 to 20% the price of either.

The secret to their success lies in blending a rubber-like polymer with a conductive, liquid electrolyte into a thin, flexible film of gel that sits between the battery electrodes.

“The polymer gel looks like a solid film, but it actually contains about 70% liquid electrolyte,” explained the study’s lead author, Professor Ian Ward from the University of Leeds.

“The remarkable thing is that we can make the separation between the solid and liquid phase at the point that it hits the electrodes.

“Safety is of paramount importance in lithium batteries. Conventional lithium batteries use electrolytes based on organic liquids; this is what you see burning in pictures of lithium batteries that catch fire. Replacing liquid electrolytes by a polymer or gel electrolyte should improve safety and lead to an all-solid-state cell,” said Professor Peter Bruce from the University of St Andrews, who was not involved in the study.

Source
Submitted by Ice-Cube

Yea, I know this is a few days old but with my excitement I couldn’t help spreading the news even further. Developer GliGli has released his new “reset glitch” for the Xbox 360 which, simply put, allows the user to run unsigned code (homebrew) on almost any Xbox 360 out to date with any dashboard revision. The glitch currently works with any Xbox 360 Slim, and users with the “Zephyr” and/or “Jasper” motherboards in their phat 360’s. Falcon support is supposedly in the works, the glitch is not compatible with non-hdmi 360’s though (Xenon & Opus). So while you can not buy a really old non-hdmi 360 off ebay, but you can go to gamestop and buy a new Xbox 360 Slim (or any HDMI model) and start running some homebrew on it!

In a really small nut shell the glitch utilizes some hardware checks during boot. The process triggers a processor glitch during start when the processor is slowed down, and instead of the 360 restarting when it notices a change in the bootloader the user is able to actually use their own bootloader, thus booting into XeLL and running some good ole fashion homebrew. The 360 is very secure software wise but luckily GliGli was able to find a hardware exploit, the key word being hardware. In order to use the reset glitch the user must solder in a Digilent C-Mod board. Luckily the boards are only $17.95 [as of this writing it was $17.95, since then Digilent won't have any in stock until Sept. 14th, and has raised the price to $22.95, and here I thought we only had ebay gougers to worry about...] through an already preestablished retailer (Digilent) so no price gouging here, so don’t be fooled by any ads on eBay that should be popping up soon. The process is relatively simple though once you get past soldering in a couple wires. Check the links below for details.

Official Site: github.com/gligli
Tutorials: libxenon :: free60
Download: Here
Source: Xbox-Scene

Talk about news that no one was expecting to see on a Wednesday…Steve Jobs has resigned as CEO of Apple, but would like to remain on as Chairman of the Board. In a letter sent to the press, Jobs makes it clear that he can no longer meet the duties and “expectations” that come with being Apple’s CEO and has asked that the board turn over those duties to Tim Cook who is currently the COO.
I have always said if there ever came a day when I could no longer meet my duties and expectations as Apple’s CEO, I would be the first to let you know. Unfortunately, that day has come.
I hereby resign as CEO of Apple. I would like to serve, if the Board sees fit, as Chairman of the Board, director and Apple employee.
As far as my successor goes, I strongly recommend that we execute our succession plan and name Tim Cook as CEO of Apple.
I believe Apple’s brightest and most innovative days are ahead of it. And I look forward to watching and contributing to its success in a new role.
I have made some of the best friends of my life at Apple, and I thank you all for the many years of being able to work alongside you.
Shocking. Whether you like Steve Jobs and Apple or not, this is massive news. He doesn’t specifically bring up the health issues that have plagued him over the last year, but one would assume that those are the driving force behind this decision. The dude has meant a lot to the world of tech, so while we bat for Team Android, we can admit that this is still a pretty sad day.
With that said, I can’t imagine that he won’t be leading the way in press conferences, product events, etc. for at least the time being. Thoughts?

Apple May Have Resized Photos Again in Samsung Case

It appears that Apple may have pulled some more photo doctoring shenanigans in their lawsuit against Samsung. Previously we reported that they were called out for using re-sized photos of the Galaxy Tab 10.1 to compare against the iPad, giving a false impression that the two tabs were identical in size. A new report seems to show potential evidence that they are doing the same thing with the iPhone 3G and the Samsung Galaxy SII smartphone. The pic above shows Apple’s evidence picture on the left showing two identically sized devices. On the right you can see an added pic showing the actual size to scale of the SGS2, clearly indicating that the phone is noticeably larger than the iPhone.

This comes hot on the heels of the new announcement that Apple has filed a motion to bar Samsung from selling all of their smartphones and tablets throughout Europe, not just the Galaxy Tab 10.1. This kind of makes you wonder if we really are seeing some sort of minor “Apple-picture-gate.” So, I have added a poll to this thread asking if you think someone within Apple intentionally doctored these pics in order to improve their chances with the lawsuit, or not. Without starting a flame-war… sound off your perspective and make your voice heard by clicking on the poll. If someone voices their ideas, remember the forum rules of no personal attacks or flames. Everyone is entitled to their opinion.